Austin Peters directs SKINCARE: “This movie is about the image of success”
Raquel Laguna/ SUCOPRESS. Austin Peters directs ELIZABETH BANKS in the movie SKINCARE. In this interview, the director talks about working with Banks and about why the actress was the perfect Hope Goldman for the film. In SKINCARE, famed aesthetician Hope Goldman (Elizabeth Banks) is about to take her career to the next level by launching her very own skincare line, but her personal and work lives are challenged when rival facialist Angel Vergara (Luis Gerardo Méndez) opens a new skincare boutique directly across from her store. She starts to suspect that someone is trying to sabotage her reputation and business, and together with her new friend Jordan (Lewis Pullman) she embarks on a mission to unravel the mystery of who is trying to destroy her life. The film also stars Lewis Pullman, Luis Gerardo Méndez, Michaela Jaé (MJ) Rodriguez and Nathan Fillion. SKINCARE, in theatres on August 16th.
Transcript
00:00but started with Elizabeth. And that's who we went to first and foremost. And we thought she would
00:04never be interested in doing a film as small as this one. But she really responded to the material.
00:10And we met and we talked about it. And she had such an exciting take on it that that was the
00:16beginning, you know, and then everybody that was that was the start because she's in every scene.
00:20And then we kind of just one by one went to the people that we thought would be amazing for these
00:26roles. And they and they responded. And it was just a very, you know, incredibly exciting,
00:31obviously. Elizabeth is such an incredible actor. And she is one of my favorites, really. And,
00:37and she has such an amazing range that she can do from comedic and dramatic and, and,
00:46and this movie required such a balance of those two things. And when we were working on the
00:52script, I really just thought this is that is someone who I want to watch play this as a fan
00:56of hers. I want to watch her play this part. I want to see her in this movie or in a movie like
01:01this. You know, in a way, it's sort of a love story between them, I think, and, and, and watching
01:07their, their relationship, though they're not necessarily in love with each other, I think we
01:14sort of get to see what they are in love with and, and the way that that affects, you know,
01:22their decision making process and what they want out of each other. So I sort of, we,
01:27we sort of, I sort of, I sort of thought of it as a love story when we were making it a lot of the
01:31time. Audiences are going to take what they want from it. And I hope they have a great time. But
01:39I think the movie is, is about the image of success and the value that we put on that and,
01:45and, and what a high sort of irregular value we put on something that isn't even real, you know,
01:54which is, which is the image of success and how important that is and how that's more important
01:58than actual success. And, and the way that that sort of throws life out of whack, I think.
02:05The biggest challenge making this movie? I don't know. I think I was, I think there were so many
02:13challenges in making this movie, but I think I just had such an amazing team of people
02:18working on it and such an amazing cast. We shot the movie, we shot with the actors for 18 days.
02:23And because it was only possible for us to shoot this many pages in that time, because they were
02:30amazing and because they were so incredible every day and were so prepared and brought so much to
02:36the characters. So I think time is always, time is always tough, but every movie has limitations,
02:42you know, there's no, there's no movie where they say, Oh, we have enough time or we have
02:46enough money, you know? So.